It really depends on what is meant by "in the market". If you just mean those that have been professionally graded then perhaps in the 75,000 range. If you mean currently available for sale then it's in the 25,000,000 area. Held out of circulation as uncs and proofs woud be around 300,000,000. Total number remaining in existence is around 23,000,000,000.
Where did you get those numbers? Considering the trillions of coins minted around the world in the last 150 years, I suspect that your 23-billion figure is way, way low.
The total of all the coins ever minted worldwide is still well under a trillion. More than half are Lincoln cents and their mintage is in the 370 billion range. The numbers are mostly just educated guesses but I did glance at a list of the mintage for the states quarters.
The Iowa P quarter is now the lowest mintage of all the state quarters and it was still over 200 million. I think your 23 Billion might be a little low. No shortage in sight.
OK, I added them up and got 22.7 billion through Texas. Add in the Iowa and Wisconsin already produced and you get in the vicinity of 23.5 billion. Of course, hundreds of millions aren't in circulation yet, though. 500 million is a reasonable estimate of the number of these coins already lost to attrition so the original number should be pretty close. There will be no shortage of these in typical condition of the major types for generations. With the large numbers saved in unc, most of these will be available at some price even longer, perhaps.
Reading some of the later posts I realized that Cladking's original numbers were strictly for State Quarters, not all coins. On that basis, I generally agree with his estimates.
From the Mint's website, compiled onto a spreadsheet, from DE through IA: Rank State/Mint Mintage 1 IA-P 213,800,000 2 OH-P 217,200,000 3 ME-D 217,400,000 4 AL-P 225,000,000 4 MO-P 225,000,000 6 IL-P 225,800,000 6 MI-D 225,800,000 8 AR-D 228,000,000 9 MO-D 228,200,000 10 AR-P 229,800,000 11 ME-P 231,400,000 12 AL-D 232,400,000 13 MI-P 233,800,000 14 IL-D 237,400,000 15 FL-P 240,200,000 16 FL-D 241,600,000 17 IA-D 251,400,000 18 TX-D 263,000,000 19 TX-P 278,800,000 20 TN-D 286,468,000 21 MS-D 289,600,000 22 MS-P 290,000,000 23 NJ-D 299,028,000 24 IN-D 327,200,000 25 PA-P 349,000,000 26 KY-P 353,000,000 27 PA-D 358,332,000 28 TN-P 361,600,000 29 LA-P 362,000,000 30 IN-P 362,600,000 31 NJ-P 363,200,000 32 KY-D 370,564,000 33 DE-P 373,400,000 34 LA-D 402,204,000 35 DE-D 410,424,000 36 OH-D 414,832,000 37 RI-P 423,000,000 38 VT-P 423,400,000 39 NC-D 427,876,000 40 RI-D 447,100,000 41 GA-P 451,188,000 42 VT-D 459,404,000 43 GA-D 488,744,000 44 NH-D 495,976,000 45 MA-D 535,184,000 46 MD-D 556,532,000 47 SC-D 566,208,000 48 NY-D 619,640,000 49 NC-P 627,600,000 50 MA-P 628,600,000 51 VA-D 651,616,000 52 NY-P 655,400,000 53 CT-D 657,880,000 54 NH-P 673,040,000 55 MD-P 678,200,000 56 CT-P 688,744,000 57 SC-P 742,576,000 58 VA-P 943,000,000 Total SQs (less proofs) struck: 23,260,360,000 As a side note, I don't believe for a single moment that there are 300,000,000 State Quarter collectors world wide. If there were, there wouldn't be any SQs in circulation; the mintages are too low for that many collectors to have even just one of each State and mint mark. Jerry
I completed a little experiment yesterday. I bought a brick of circ quarters and counted the state quarters versus the standard Washington. Here are the totals: 961 Washington Quarters 8 Delaware (P) 3 Delaware (D) 17 PA (P) 1 PA (D) 2 NJ (P) 9 NJ (D) 6 GA (P) 7 CT (P) 6 CT (D) 71 MASS (P) 58 MD (P) 29 MD (D) 1 SC (P) 3 SC (D) 17 NH (P) 5 NH (D) 87 VA (P) 37 NY (P) 8 NY (D) 74 NC (P) 19 NC (D) 25 RI (P) 14 RI (D) 21 VT (P) 31 KY (P) 2 KY (D) 17 TN (P) 31 IN (P) 9 MISS (P) 1 MISS (D) 78 IL (P) 4 IL (D) 36 AL (P) 27 ME (P) 2 ME (D) 33 MO (P) 16 MO (D) 34 AK (P) 20 AK (D) 41 MI (P) 3 MI (D) 59 FL (P) 3 FL (D) 67 IA (P) Not that this is scientific, but shows that for the most part, there are pleanty of quarters to go around. A few states noticible missing though. Scarse? I doubt it though. Maybe just at this bank in Delaware.
It takes time for freely circulating coins to mix thoroughly with the coins already in circulation. Figure about eight years. The states coins don't circulate completely freely since many people save them before and after they go into circulation. The old eagle reverse coins are pretty evenly distributed now but it will take time for the states issues to actually reflect their mintages. While no one would claim any of these are scarce it should be remembered there are lots of people working on sets of these. Some of the low mintage issues will have a significant percentage of the mintage tied up in collections.
If anybody remembers, how long did it take for wheat back cents to dissapear from general circualtion? I imagine the same thing could happen to "eagle back quarters" and "Monticello back nickels".
It was about 1970 before the percentage of wheaties in circulation stabilized. Perhaps I'm being miopic but I doubt the old quarters will disappear in the foreseeable future. The better ones are already disappearing, but the typical coin will have no premium in our lifetime so it's difficult to imagine them being removed.
